


Imagine You're a Deer

by angel1876



Category: Original Work
Genre: Anxiety, Gen, Metaphor for abuse, Monologue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-29
Updated: 2020-01-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:01:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22458400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel1876/pseuds/angel1876
Summary: Imagine you’re a prey animal. Imagine you’re a deer.You were born in a forest. Just this big, wide maze of trees and noise that seems to go on forever. You’re young, and everything around you is brand new. Things are scary most of the time and you stick as close to your family as you can because they’ll protect you.Your family happens to be a pack of wolves.
Kudos: 7





	Imagine You're a Deer

Imagine you’re a prey animal. Imagine you’re a deer. 

You were born in a forest. Just this big, wide maze of trees and noise that seems to go on forever. You’re young, and everything around you is brand new. Things are scary most of the time and you stick as close to your family as you can because they’ll protect you.

Your family happens to be a pack of wolves. 

These wolves, they’re fierce. They’re pack animals. They’re quick to defend their territory and they chase every scary thing away with tooth and claw. They make you feel safe. They love you.

But they have a hierarchy that, sometimes, is just as terrifying as the world outside of their little bubble. Fights break out often. Almost every day, it seems, the wolves bite and snarl at each other over things that you, a young deer half their size, can’t imagine ever pursuing.

You hate that they fight yet love them for protecting you.

As with all young deer, you start to grow big. The more you grow, the less they treat you like something that needs to be kept safe, and more like something that needs to be fought.

Wolves have a complex social structure. Disputes are solved with posturing, a dance of bared fangs and threats that, among their own, are understood to be empty. Displays of dominance with the intention that no wolf is left without their fair share.

Bigger now, bolder and used to affection, you assert yourself, and the wolves in turn push you down. Those same angered snarls directed at you, just as aggressive now as they always were with each other, and though you are pack you are also a deer. You were made to fear the feeling of paws on your shoulder and maws at your throat.

The wolves don’t understand, and they expect you to push back. They expect you to be like them. They respond to a perceived ploy for dominance and they read your terror as submission.

You are a deer.

Your family loves you, because you are easy to get along with. They don’t have to posture with you. They don’t even have to lift a paw.

They think you’re shy, the wolves. They think you could be strong, that you could shove them around if you really wanted, and your compliance is a choice. They don’t know how different their teeth feel to you.

You are grown. You’ve lived in the forest all your life. You are a deer that comes from a family of wolves.

One day, you meet another deer while you’re out eating grass. With a playful cuff, they challenge you for a particularly nice patch. They expect you to fight for what you want, with antlers, and hooves, and coiled muscle, because prey animals take pride in self preservation.

You don’t understand why they’re so horrified when you roll over and cower, your throat bared to them.


End file.
